Friday, February 28, 2014

Two-day prov’l summit on risk reduction held

LINGAYEN---The Regional Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council (RDRRMC) in collaboration with the Provincial Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council (PDRRMC) spearheaded the provincial summit for local chief executives and the Disaster Risk Reduction Management Officers (DRRMOs) of the cities and municipalities of Pangasinan held on February 26 to 27, at the Pangasinan Training and Development Center here.

The two-day summit is a provincial version of the Disaster Risk Reduction Management summits held at the national level and the regional level by the National Disaster Risk Reduction Management Council (NDRRMC).

Civil Defense Region 1 Director Melchito M. Castro said the activity aims to capacitate the local chief executives to ensure the integration of DRRM and Climate Change Adaptation in local development plans, programs and budgets as a strategy in sustainable development and poverty reduction.

Castro who is also the chairperson of RDRRMC said this also seeks to approve, monitor and evaluate the implementation of the Local Disaster Risk Reduction Management Plan and test the plan consistent with other national and local planning programs and recommend the implementation of forced or preemptive evacuation of local residents, if necessary.

As this developed, Castro congratulated the Province of Pangasinan for being the first province in Region 1 to conduct its Provincial DRRM summit.

He likewise thanked the participants for the proactive involvement especially the PDRRMC who played host to the event as he expressed gratitude to Gov. Amado T. Espino, Jr. who showed great leadership and proactive involvement in DRRM.

Castro said “this partaking is surely an immense leap towards making Pangasinan a disaster resilient fortress.”

Provincial Administrator Rafael Howard Baraan, on the other hand, urged all the participants to be prepared especially during disasters as he stressed that organization at the community level is very important.

“We have no one to depend on but ourselves,” Baraan said as he called on the people to take care of nature that protects us from disasters.

“Let us not be passive but pro-active,” Baraan said as he pointed out that we should simplify and not complicate.

“Reduce problems to the simplest form to come with the right and simplest solution,” Baraan said.

Topics discussed during the two-day summit include the following: Science for Safer Communities, Local Geological Hazards, Earthquake and Earthquake Hazards, Rain-Induced Landslides/Flood, Full Implementation of the Smart InfoBoard, and Incident Command System.